“5177. Ossuary with human bones. The deceased was placed in a niche (koh) in a rock hewn tomb. After about one year, when the body had decomposed, the bones were collected and placed in an ossuary which was placed into the same or another rock hewn tomb structure next to several other ossuaries usually belonging to the same family. This practice seems to have been in use from the second half of the first century B.C. until the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.”””
Photograph by Zev Radovan
